2 days in Port Stephens, NSW

I visited Port Stephens, NSW as part of a group tour with IntroTravel. We spent 2 days doing lots of fun activities.
|| Related: A Week With OzIntro ||
We left Sydney at 7:30am and it was about a 2 hour drive. We went to the beach and had a beginner’s surf lesson with MojoSurf. We were taught the hand signals for beach safety and how to spot a potential riptide.
We spent about half an hour having a safety demonstration and practicing lying down to standing on the sand and then it was time to try & surf. The waves weren’t too big here so it was great for beginners but we’d gone on a fairly calm day so we didn’t get too many good chances on the waves.
We got an hour in the water and I even managed to stand up a few times which I was pretty proud of considering I’ve never been on a surf board before!
After our surf lesson we had a picnic on the beach before getting back on the bus to go to visit some wild (but used to humans) kangaroos! Our first experience with kangaroos.
We got to stroke them, we fed them carrots & even saw a mother kangaroo with a joey in her pouch which was amazing.
In the mid-afternoon we visited Murray’s Winery & Brewery where you can do wine/beer/cider tasting which can then turn into buying!
We arrived at our hostel, Melaleuca Backpackers in Anna Bay, Port Stephens and checked in straight away. It is a bush hostel and a campsite and is actually one of my favourite hostels.
At 8am the next morning, we went to Stockton Sand Dunes or Worimi Conservation Lands. It feels like you’ve driven into the middle of the Sahara Desert, it is huge!
It is the newest (at the time of visiting, Feb 2018) UNESCO World Heritage Site as requested by the Aboriginal owners. This means it is protected from land developers and classed as a National Park.
We went sand boarding which was fun going down, not so fun trying to climb back up the hill!
You could head to the beach afterwards or drive a little further out and do a coastal walk with beautiful panoramic view.
In the late afternoon you can head over to Nelson Bay and go on a dolphin cruise. This was a really beautiful afternoon.
Have you ever visited Port Stephens? What else would you recommend to do?

5 thoughts on “2 days in Port Stephens, NSW”

You brought back lots of amazing memories. We used to go to Nelson Bay for holidays every year when I was a child. I remember driving around that last bend and there was the glittering blue water. Dad actually retired there years ago.